MAKEUP REVOLUTION | Ultra Metals Sculpt & Blend

It's been a while since I've featured Makeup Revolution on here, but this package really caught my attention more than most.

Like a lot of people, I've really had a keen eye on the Real Techniques Bold Metals collection - but am I going to shell out all that money for each brush? Hell no.  So was I happy when I saw this land on my doorstep? (oh and by doorstep, I mean get a red card through the letterbox and then queue for 20 mins at the post office to collect it) Hell yes!

These are seriously beautiful brushes.  They have a lovely weight to them, not too heavy, and the bristles are really soft.  Definitely their best quality brushes I've tries from them yet.  As well as the 3 brushes, you also get a black beauty blender - I have yet to try this, but I can imagine it's not going to look good after the first use!

This, without doubt, would make a lovely Christmas present for makeup loving friends/family, or as a stocking filler (or lets face it, a treat for ourselves!). 

I'm super impressed with these and can't wait to include them in my brush rotation.  If you're looking for a set yourself, you can buy them for £14.99* from the Makeup Revolution store.

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MAKEUP REVOLUTION | Mermaids Forever Palette

Go back a month or two ago, and Makeup Revolution caused a storm of excitement when they released their Mermaids Forever eye shadow palette, packed with 32 different colours, it really does look like there's something for everyone.

The shades start off as cooler tones across the top, finishing off as very deep warm tones that really pack some punch.  There's a fantastic range of colours included, right across the spectrum - highlight shades, corals, pinks/reds, purples, blues, greens, browns and silvery smoky shades.

Granted, not all of these colours are for everyone, some of the more adventurous shades could be used as tiny accents though, under the eye or as a hint of colour in the crease.  The brows, reds and coral's are my most used shades, in fact, I created this Summer Sunset look using this palette recently.

You can see that the pigmentation is great, the shades are soft, some are buttery, and all blend well with little to no fallout (this could be partially down to my application technique - patting the colour on) and all are shimmery.  The palette costs a purse-friendly £8, would you wear these colours?

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MAKEUP REVOLUTION | Iconic Pro Lipsticks

It's been a little while since I featured a Makeup Revolution product on here, so I thought I'd share these beauties with you as they particularly caught my attention.

Makeup Revolution have an 'Iconic Pro' series - and so far, everything I've experienced from this range, I've really loved - especially their Lorac Pro dupe, the Iconic 1 palette (so pretty!).  New to the Iconic Pro range are these lovely lipsticks.  They came in little matte black boxes, and the lipstick casing themselves resemble the MAC lipsticks in their shape, but with a glossy black finish and rose gold detailing - perfection!

The formula is very different from most of the lipsticks in my collection, and is fairly hard to describe... I'd say they're on the more sheer side, but with a soft buttery almost vinyl like texture/finish.  The range of shades is impressive (20 in all) and only cost £2.49 each, which really is fantastic.

// Excuse my skin - I don't believe in photoshopping my images //

Despite them being more on the sheer side, you can see it's not terribly hard to get good coverage out of them.  Of the shades I was sent, the pink (It eats you up) and the red (Duel) are my favourites and the ones I'd be most likely to wear again - I'm not really a fan of nudes that are lighter than my natural lip colour, they just don't suit me.

Again, the texture of these is really unique, very vinyl like, or even slightly waxy but more buttery than waxy - I really liked it.

If you'd like to take a peek at their full range, you can find their website here.

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Makeup Revolution Ultra brow palette

My swatches have come out a little paler than they actually are - you can see in my eye brow pic below how pigmented and dark they are

It's been a while since I shared with you a new Makeup Revolution release so I thought I'd throw some caution to the wind and not break the habit of a lifetime :)  I've had this in my collection for about 2 weeks now and is currently available for £7.99 as part of their Ultra series.

This palette is the same size as their eye shadow palettes, so quite sizeable! Certainly one to keep at home in your collection and not in your travel makeup bag.  The palette has 4 brow powders, 2 wax's, a concealer, a highlighter, a brow pencil, 2 brushes and a set of tweezers. There's also a huge mirror that fills up the lid of the palette.

The shadows have decent pigmentation (you don't want anything overly intense for your brows!) and they have a nice range of shades for light to medium. I tend to use the two darker ones.  I can't comment on what the waxes are like as I don't tend to use them - I prefer to set my brows with either a clear mascara or a tinted brow gel.  I've also been using the concealer and highlighter - not products I tend to use, but since I have them I thought I'd give them a whirl.  They really do help to create a more precise brow and lighten and brighten above and below the brow - I'm a convert!

This is a really nice kit which is great value for money and the brushes included are really decent too - I haven't felt I'd had to reach for a different brow brush to apply the product.  My only niggle with this palette, is a tiny one - I'm not sure if it's the pencil or the tweezers, but something is stopping me being able to close the lid shut. It's not a palette I'd take out of the house anyway, but it is a bit annoying that I can't close it :P

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Makeup Revolution | Give Them Nightmares palette

Dramatic Evening Look

Wearable Day Look

[Each of the above looks were created using the same 3 colours - The Hunger (all over the lid), Wicked (outer half) and Beyond the night (outer V and crease)]

I've had this palette in my mitts for some time and haven't gotten around to photographing a look wearing it until today.  Greens are pretty much my favourite colours to wear, and purples.  So I thought I'd focus on one colour set in the palette to create my look - and I picked green.  I am a little surprised though that it's photographed pretty grey - my mother-in-law said it does look pretty grey on the lids too in real life (I think it looks quite green, but maybe I'm just seeing what I want to see).

This palette was launched in time for Halloween last year, it's packed with deep dark colours, some with glitter, some are shimmery and the bottom row are all mattes.  All the colours are really well pigmented and work well together.

Going back a couple years ago this would have been more of an every day palette for me and not one for more dramatic looks, however I tend to reach for what's easier and more fool-proof now, which is neutral shades - bringing the focus onto the eyeliner and mascara.  I liked the quality of these - I did start with an eye shadow primer, and then a matte skin coloured shadow all over the lid to give a nice even base.

For the every day look I created, I did struggle a little to get a more muted look with decent blending, I found that I had to add more shadow to get a smoother finish, so creating the every day look was a little more challenging than the dramatic look.  What I like is that I created both with the exact same shadows, and in the same places - one was full on and one was toned down - it's amazing how different they are, with the same colours in the same places.

All in all this is a nice palette - but I would suggest saving it for more dramatic full-on looks as subtlety isn't a word I'd use to describe Give Them Nightmares.

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NOTEWORTHY | High Street Blushers

When I wrote my last Five Favs post, I had a request to create a high street version of it.  Without reaslising it all the blushers I'd picked for Five Favs were high end, D'Oh! So I thought I'd go through my collection and pick out a few blushers from the high street I've really loved.  As much as I adore these shades, it's as much that as the brands themselves and formula's that I love.

As you can see, there's a pretty wide spread of shades, some being perfect for spring, and others might be more autumnal - personally I don't really wear blusher colours for seasons, more for my mood or to suit the look I'm wearing.

Makeup Revolution The One Blush Stick - £5*

Now these are pretty amazing - they're a cream product which is very well pigmented.  They blend beautifully and come in 8 different shades - 4 are matte and 4 are shimmery, including bronzers and highlighters - a really lovely collection.  They are dupes for the NARS Multiple blusher stick which is a more hefty £29 - personally with a price difference like that, there's no real contest.

Bourjois Cream Blush in 03 - £7.99*

This really is a beautiful blusher. I'm a real fan of Bourjois, their products are great quality and ooze of sophistication and class.  This shade, 03, is absolutely gorgeous and subtly shimmery.  It blends into the skin beautifully creating a gorgeous soft glow, always a winner in my book.

NYX Blusher in Summer Peach - £6

The NYX blushers are renowned for being fantastic, and boast a lot of dupes for high end brands, like Pinched as a dupe for NARS Orgasm.  This shade, summer peach, is possibly my favourite shade from NYX - it's peachy and beautiful, while being shimmery like Pinched, adding a stunning glow. NYX blushers are great value for money and a really great quality - not cray cray pigmented unlike other brands - this is a good thing.

Maybelline blusher in Flash Plum - £5.19

I really adore this blusher, the shimmery plumyness (is that a word?) of it is amazing, and SO beautiful in autumn... or any other time of year ;)  Now, the quality is great, although I have had the issue with this one where it goes all shiny on top, making it impossible to pick up product, so I've had to scratch it up to stop that happening.  It's nicely pigmented and really blendable, an absolute favourite of mine.

So there you go, they're some of my favourite blushers from the high street - both new and old and all still available to purchase.  All prices are correct at time of writing.

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*Post contains some PR samples, previously blogged about

Makeup Revolution I ♥ Makeup | Limited Edition Obsession Palettes

Makeup Revolution have released some new Limited Edition palettes costing just £3.99 each, what a bargain!  Each palette is made up of 10 shadows, with a mix of shimmers and mattes - some more shimmery than others.  The two I have is West End Girls (my fav!) and Born to Die.  There's loads of swatches and pics below, so do take a look! 

This is the Born to Die palette - a pretty and delicate neutrals palette - I think the 3rd and 6th shades are my favourite - I really love the MUR shimmery shades, they're a lovely quality with not too much fallout, and aren't very glittery, just what I like :)  These are decent sized pans to, so you get a good amount of product for your money.  I love how every shadow is embossed too - the top shades saying 'obsession' and the bottom ones having 'I <3'.  If you're more of a lippie lover and prefer to wear soft gentle shades then this might be a great palette for you - the shades are delicate and elegant, but can be really smoked out to turn it into a night look.

Of the two palettes, this West End Girls palette is by far my favourite, I love the colours, I mean, just look at that blue with blue & red glitter in it!! The colours are stunning and would look great with them in the crease, under the eye, or all over.  Also there's a shade which really reminds me of 'Peach Fizz' from the Too Faced Shadow Bon Bons palette, the the one second on the left, bottom row, VERY pretty.  I can't wait to get creative and create some looks with this - so much possibility!

I love these palettes, especially the more colourful ones :)  Yeah I'm a total sucker for nudes and have countless nude palettes, but I also love wearing greens, purples, blues and the odd gold.

What do you think will be the best way to wear that dark blue? Smoked under the eye, or all over the lid, or just the crease?

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Makeup Revolution I ♥ Makeup | Black Velvet palette

Following on from the faux fur adorned palette that Makeup Revolution | I <3 Makeup launched a week or so ago, they've today released a velvet palette which is predominantly mattes.  

After experiencing the mattes in the fur palette, I was a bit nervous about how well pigmented these would be.  I think the problem with the faux fur palette is that the matte shades that were in there were on the lighter shade, and lets face it, light mattes are never going to show up well on my pale old skin!  The true test is the darker shades, and I have to say, the darker mattes in this palette were decent, as you can see in the swatches.  In fact, I liked the formulation - they were what I'd describe as smokey.  I actually really like the effect of them under the eye to smoke out the look, nicer than shimmery shades.

As you might expect, the shimmer shades in this palette are awesome, there's 3 of them to pick from: a beige, a brown and a grey - perfect for a smokey eye.  The mattes are nice quality too, apart from the pale shades which aren't bad, but they don't show up that well on my skin, however, they do work nicely as a base shade to build on and add colour to, sort of giving you a blank matte canvas on which to craft your look.

I'm actually looking forward to playing around with this palette more, creating some deep, dark, smokey looks using the right hand side of the palette.  It's always a challenge to create a nice look with matte eye shadows when you have lids as bumpy as mine! :)  I always like a challenge!

You can pick this up on the Makeup Revolution website for £7.99 from today.

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Makeup Revolution I ♥ Makeup | Naked Underneath

I feel like I start every Makeup Revolution palette like this, but once again they are making waves in the beauty community with another great palette - this time the palette is covered in faux fur and has been inspired by that, and their love of animals.

Under the lid you'll find 16 high quality animal-inspired eye shadows, and a full size mirror with double-ended sponge applicator and will set you back £7.99*.

Just like you might expect, this is another great palette with a great mix of shimmers and mattes. The quality is decent, but I think it's fair to say the shimmery shades are more pigmented than most of the mattes - some mattes are great, but the lighter shades don't show quite as well (the swatches are on top of a primer).

I love the quality of MUR shimmery shades, they're so soft, buttery and blendable and sit really nicely on top of matte shades just to add some pop - all all by themselves.  I've always been a fan of neutral-toned palettes, espeically when they include a diverse mix of mattes, shimmers, and some berry-toned shades too.  This one does have a glittery shade too, it's on the top row, and it's the shade that's 2nd from the right - it's like a dark smoky grey with a red glitter, very pretty.

What's your favourite Makeup Revolution palette?

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